International pressure mounts for Gaza truce

GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel bombed dozens of suspected militant sites in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip on Monday and Palestinians kept up their cross-border rocket fire as international pressure for a truce intensified.

Twelve Palestinian civilians and four fighters were killed in the air strikes, bringing the Gaza death toll since fighting began on Wednesday to 90, more than half of them non-combatants, local officials said. Three Israeli civilians have been killed.

After an overnight lull, militants in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip fired 12 rockets at southern Israel in the span of 10 minutes, causing no casualties, police said. One landed near a school, but it was closed at the time.

The deaths of 11 Palestinian civilians - nine from one family - in an air strike on Sunday - drew more international calls for an end to six days of hostilities and could test Western support for an offensive Israel billed as self-defedefensence after years of cross-border rocket attacks.

Israel's military did not immediately comment on a report in the liberal Haaretz newspaper that it had mistakenly fired on the Dalu family home, where the dead spanned four generations, while trying to kill a Hamas rocketry chief.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was due to arrive in Cairo to weigh in on ceasefire efforts led by Egypt, which borders both Israel and Gaza and whose Muslim Brotherhood-rooted government has been hosting leaders of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, a smaller armed faction in the Palestinian enclave.

Israeli media said a delegation from Israel had also been to Cairo for the truce talks. A spokesman for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government declined comment on the matter.

Italian Foreign Minister Giulio Terzi, speaking in Brussels ahead of a meeting of European Union foreign ministers, said: "I believe there are the conditions to quickly reach a ceasefire in the next few hours."

He said that from his conversations with members of the Israeli government, he understood "there is no interest at all" to invade the Gaza Strip.

"Exactly the opposite is true," Terzi said. "Obviously, this Israeli self-restraint should rely on a guarantee that the launches of rockets should end."

China on Monday urged both sides to halt the violence, while U.S. President Barack Obama said at the weekend it would be "preferable" if Israel did not mount a ground invasion of Gaza.

The Gaza flare-up, and Israel's repeated signaling that it could soon escalate from the aerial campaign to a ground sweep of the cramped and impoverished territory, have stoked the worries of world powers watching an already combustible region.

In the absence of any prospect of permanent peace between Israel and Hamas and other Islamist factions, mediated deals for each to hold fire unilaterally have been the only formula for stemming bloodshed in the past. But both sides now placed the onus on the other.

Izzat Risheq, aide to Hamas politburo chief Khaled Meshaal, wrote on Facebook that Hamas would enter a truce only after Israel "stops its aggression, ends its policy of targeted assassinations and lifts the blockade of Gaza".

Listing Israel's terms, Vice Prime Minister Moshe Yaalon wrote on Twitter: "If there is quiet in the south and no rockets and missiles are fired at Israel's citizens, nor terrorist attacks engineered from the Gaza Strip, we will not attack."

Yaalon also said Israel wanted an end to Gaza guerrilla activity in the neighboring Egyptian Sinai, a desert peninsula where lawlessness has spread during Cairo's political crises.

AIR STRIKES

Israel bombed some 80 sites in Gaza overnight, the military said, adding in a statement that targets included "underground rocket launching sites, terror tunnels and training bases" as well as "buildings owned by senior terrorist operatives".

Netanyahu has said he had assured world leaders that Israel was doing its utmost to avoid causing civilian casualties in Gaza. At least 22 of the Gaza fatalities have been children, medical officials said.

China, which has cultivated good ties with Israel, said on Monday it was extremely concerned about the Israeli military operations in Gaza.

"We condemn the over-use of force causing deaths and injuries amongst innocent ordinary people," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told a daily news briefing in Beijing.

Before leaving for Cairo, Ban urged Israel and the Palestinians to cooperate with all Egyptian-led efforts to reach an immediate ceasefire.

In scenes recalling Israel's 2008-2009 winter invasion of Gaza, tanks, artillery and infantry have massed in field encampments along the sandy, fenced-off border and military convoys moved on roads in the area.

Israel has also authorized the call-up of 75,000 military reservists, so far mobilizing around half that number.

A big, bloody rocket strike might be enough for Netanyahu to give a green light for a ground offensive, despite the political risks of heavy casualties before a January election he is favored to win.

But while 84 percent of Israelis supported the Gaza assault, according to a Haaretz poll, only 30 percent wanted an invasion. Nineteen percent wanted their government to work on securing a truce soon.

Israel's declared goal is to deplete Gaza arsenals and force Hamas to stop rocket fire that has bedeviled Israeli border towns for years.

The rockets now have greater range, becoming a strategic weapon for Gaza's otherwise massively outgunned militants. Several projectiles have targeted Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. None hit the two cities and some of the rockets were shot down by Israel's Iron Dome interceptor system.

As a precaution against the rocket interceptions endangering nearby Ben-Gurion International Airport, civil aviation authorities said on Monday new flight paths were being used.

There was no indication takeoffs and landings at Ben-Gurion had been affected.

SWORN ENEMIES

Hamas and other groups in Gaza are sworn enemies of the Jewish state which they refuse to recognize and seek to eradicate, claiming all Israeli territory as rightfully theirs.

Hamas won legislative elections in the Palestinian Territories in 2006 but a year later, after the collapse of a unity government under President Mahmoud Abbas the Islamist group seized control of Gaza in a brief and bloody civil war with forces loyal to Abbas.

Abbas then dismissed the Hamas government led by the group's leader Ismail Haniyeh but he refuses to recognize Abbas' authority and runs Gazan affairs.

While it is denounced as a terrorist organization in the West, Hamas enjoys widespread support in the Arab world, where Islamist parties are on the rise.

U.S.-backed Abbas and Fatah hold sway in the Israeli-occupied West Bank from their seat of government in the town of Ramallah. The Palestinians seek to establish an independent state in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip with East Jerusalem as its capital.

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China M&A activity in Europe increasing: study

BEIJING : Chinese merger and acquisition activity in Europe in the first quarter of 2012 surpassed that of European firms in China for the first time, a study has shown, highlighting China's growing global impact.

"Chinese investors feel that the lingering uncertainty in the eurozone increases their chances of securing favourable deals with debt-laden European companies that were until now inaccessible," Helene Rives, head of China Business Group for PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), said Monday in a statement.

A recent PwC report found that in the first three months of this year, 32 investment deals by Chinese companies were recorded in Europe compared with 26 by European companies in China.

"This marks the first time that deal flow volume has been greater to Europe than to China," the report said.

Europe-bound deals by mainland Chinese investors steadily increased from 11 in 2006 to 61 in 2011, the report said, adding that figures from early this year indicate another annual increase.

The report said a "relatively weak euro and declining valuations have proved fertile ground for Chinese investors to find good deals" amid the eurozone crisis.

From Europe to China, deals fell from 163 in 2006 to a low of 85 in 2009 "as European investors felt the effects of the credit crunch and the impending eurozone crisis", the report said.

European M&A recovered, however, to total 125 deals in 2011, PwC said.

Last year European companies invested 7 billion euros (US$8.9 billion) in China in M&A deals, while Chinese investments in Europe totalled more than 11 billion euros, according to the report.

- AFP/ch

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Justice Katju reacts to TOI report, asks Prithviraj Chavan to probe Facebook user's arrest

NEW DELHI: Press Council chief Markandey Katju has asked Maharashtra CM Prithviraj Chavan to inquire in to the wrongful arrest of a woman for protesting against a bandh following Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray's death.

Reacting to a TOI report that had said that a woman had been arrested for protesting against the shut down in Mumbai on the occasion of Thackeray's death on social networking site facebook Katju said it was "absurd" to say that protest would hurt religious sentiment.

Katju said that the arrest was a criminal act since under sections 341 and 342 it is a crime to wrongfully arrest or wrongfully confine someone who has committed no crime.

"Hence if the facts reported are correct, I request you to immediately order the suspension, arrest, chargesheeting and criminal prosecution of the police personnel (however high they may be) who ordered as well as implemented the arrest of that woman, failing which I will deem it that you as chief minister are unable to run the state in a democratic manner as envisaged by the Constitution to which you have taken oath, and then the legal consequences will follow," he added.

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EU drug regulator OKs Novartis' meningitis B shot

LONDON (AP) — Europe's top drug regulator has recommended approval for the first vaccine against meningitis B, made by Novartis AG.

There are five types of bacterial meningitis. While vaccines exist to protect against the other four, none has previously been licensed for type B meningitis. In Europe, type B is the most common, causing 3,000 to 5,000 cases every year.

Meningitis mainly affects infants and children. It kills about 8 percent of patients and leaves others with lifelong consequences such as brain damage.

In a statement on Friday, Andrin Oswald of Novartis said he is "proud of the major advance" the company has made in developing its vaccine Bexsero. It is aimed at children over two months of age, and Novartis is hoping countries will include the shot among the routine ones for childhood diseases such as measles.

Novartis said the immunization has had side effects such as fever and redness at the injection site.

Recommendations from the European Medicines Agency are usually adopted by the European Commission. Novartis also is seeking to test the vaccine in the U.S.

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Palestinian Civilian Toll Climbs in Gaza

Israeli aircraft struck crowded areas in the Gaza Strip on Monday, driving up the civilian death toll and in one case devastating several homes belonging to one clan — the fallout from a new tactic in Israel's six-day-old offensive meant to quell Hamas rocket fire on Israel.

Escalating its bombing campaign, Israel on Sunday began attacking homes of activists in Hamas, the Islamic militant group that rules Gaza. These attacks have led to a sharp spike in civilian casualties, killing 24 civilians in less than 24 hours, a Gaza health official said. Overall, the offensive that began Wednesday killed 91 Palestinians, including 50 civilians.

The rising civilian toll was likely to intensify pressure on Israel to end the fighting. Hundreds of civilian casualties in an Israeli offensive in Gaza four years ago led to fierce international condemnation of Israel.

Hamas fighters, meanwhile, have fired hundreds of rockets into Israel in the current round of fighting, including 12 on Monday, among them one that hit an empty school.

The new airstrikes came as Egypt was trying to broker a cease-fire, with the help of Turkey and Qatar. The Turkish foreign minister and a delegation of Arab foreign ministers were expected in Gaza on Tuesday. However, Israel and Hamas appeared far apart in their demands, and a quick end to the fighting seemed unlikely.

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In Monday's violence, a missile struck a three-story home in the Gaza City's Zeitoun area, flattening the building and badly damaging several nearby homes. Shell-shocked residents searching for belongings climbed over debris of twisted metal and cement blocks in the street.

The strike killed two children and two adults, and injured 42 people, said Gaza heath official Ashraf al-Kidra.

Residents said Israel first sent a warning strike at around 2 a.m. Monday, prompting many residents in the area to flee their homes. A few minutes later, heavy bombardment followed.

Ahed Kitati, 38, had rushed out after the warning missile to try to hustle people to safety. But he was fatally struck by a falling cinderblock, leaving behind a pregnant wife, five young daughters and a son, the residents said.

Sitting in mourning with her mother and siblings just hours after her father's death, 11-year-old Aya Kitati clutched a black jacket, saying she was freezing, even though the weather was mild. "We were sleeping, and then we heard the sound of the bombs," she said, then broke down sobbing.

Ahed's brother, Jawad Kitati, said he plucked the lifeless body of a 2-year-old relative from the street and carried him to an ambulance. Blood stains smeared his jacket sleeve.

Another clan member, Haitham Abu Zour, 24, woke up to the sound of the warning strike and hid in a stairwell. He emerged to find his wife dead and his two infant children buried under the debris, but safe.

Clan elder Mohammed Azzam, 61, denied that anyone in his family had any connections to Hamas.

"The Jews are liars," he said. "No matter how much they pressure our people, we will not withdraw our support for Hamas."

Late Sunday, an Israeli missile killed a father and his eight-year-old son on the roof of their Gaza City home. The father, a Hamas policeman, was on the roof to repair a leaking water tank, his relatives said.

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Israel, Gaza fighting rages on as Egypt seeks truce

GAZA/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israel bombed Palestinian militant targets in the Gaza Strip from air and sea for a fifth straight day on Sunday, preparing for a possible ground invasion while also spelling out its conditions for a truce.

Palestinian fire into Israel subsided during the night but resumed in the morning, with rockets targeting the country's commercial capital Tel Aviv for a fourth day. The two missiles were shot down by Israel's Iron Dome air shield.

Speaking shortly after the attack, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel was ready to widen its offensive.

"We are exacting a heavy price from Hamas and the terrorist organizations and the Israel Defence Forces are prepared for a significant expansion of the operation," he said at a cabinet meeting, giving no further details.

Some 51 Palestinians, about half of them civilians, including 14 children, have been killed since the Israeli offensive began, Palestinian officials said, with hundreds wounded. More than 500 rockets fired from Gaza have hit Israel, killing three civilians and wounding dozens.

Israel unleashed intensive air strikes on Wednesday, killing the military commander of the Islamist Hamas movement that governs Gaza and spurns peace with the Jewish state.

Israel's declared goal is to deplete Gaza arsenals and press Hamas into stopping cross-border rocket fire that has bedeviled Israeli border towns for years and is now displaying greater range, putting Tel Aviv and Jerusalem in the crosshairs.

Air raids continued past midnight into Sunday, with warships shelling from the sea. Two Gaza City media buildings were hit, witnesses said, wounding six journalists and damaging facilities belonging to Hamas's Al-Aqsa TV as well as Britain's Sky News.

An employee of Beirut-based al Quds television station lost his leg in the attack, medics said.

An Israeli military spokeswoman said the strike had targeted a rooftop "transmission antenna used by Hamas to carry out terror activity". International media organizations demanded further clarification.

Three other attacks killed three children and wounded 14 other people, medical officials said, with heavy thuds regularly jolting the small, densely populated coastal enclave.

Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi said in Cairo, as his security deputies sought to broker a truce with Hamas leaders, that "there are some indications that there is a possibility of a ceasefire soon, but we do not yet have firm guarantees".

Egypt has mediated previous ceasefire deals between Israel and Hamas, the latest of which unraveled with recent violence.

A Palestinian official told Reuters the truce discussions would continue in Cairo on Sunday, saying "there is hope", but that it was too early to say whether the efforts would succeed.

At a Gaza news conference, Hamas military spokesman Abu Ubaida voiced defiance, saying: "This round of confrontation will not be the last against the Zionist enemy and it is only the beginning."

SYRIAN FRONT

Israel's military also saw action along the northern frontier, firing into Syria on Saturday in what it said was a response to shooting aimed at its troops in the occupied Golan Heights. Israel's chief military spokesman, citing Arab media, said it appeared Syrian soldiers were killed in the incident.

There were no reported casualties on the Israeli side from the shootings, the third case this month of violence that has been seen as a spillover of battles between Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's forces and rebels trying to overthrow him.

With tanks and artillery poised along the Gaza frontier for a possible ground operation, Israel's cabinet decided on Friday to double the current reserve troop quota set for the offensive to 75,000. Some 30,000 soldiers have already been called up.

"If there is quiet in the south and no rockets and missiles are fired at Israel's citizens, nor terrorist attacks engineered from the Gaza Strip, we will not attack," Israeli Vice Prime Minister Moshe Yaalon wrote on Twitter.

Israel's operation so far has drawn Western support for what U.S. and European leaders have called its right to self-defense, but there was also a growing number of appeals from them to seek an end to the hostilities.

Netanyahu, in his comments at Sunday's cabinet session, said he had emphasized in telephone conversations with world leaders "the effort Israel is making to avoid harming civilians, while Hamas and the terrorist organizations are making every effort to hit civilian targets in Israel".

Israel withdrew settlers from Gaza in 2005 and two years later Hamas took control of the slender, impoverished territory, which the Israelis have kept under blockade.

PRESSURE ON SIDES TO "DE-ESCALATE"

British Prime Minister David Cameron "expressed concern over the risk of the conflict escalating further and the danger of further civilian casualties on both sides", in a conversation with Netanyahu, a spokesperson for Cameron said.

Britain was "putting pressure on both sides to de-escalate," the spokesman said, adding that Cameron had urged Netanyahu "to do everything possible to bring the conflict to an end."

Ben Rhodes, a deputy national security adviser to President Barack Obama, said the United States would like to see the conflict resolved through "de-escalation" and diplomacy, but also believed Israel had the right to self-defense.

Diplomats at the United Nations said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon was expected to visit Israel and Egypt in the coming week to push for an end to the fighting.

A possible move into the Gaza Strip and the risk of major casualties it brings would be a significant gamble for Netanyahu, favored to win a January election.

The last Gaza war, a three-week Israeli blitz and invasion over the New Year of 2008-09, killed 1,400 Palestinians, mostly civilians. Thirteen Israelis died in the conflict.

The current flare-up around Gaza has fanned the fires of a Middle East ignited by a series of Arab uprisings and a civil war in Syria that threatens to spread beyond its borders.

One significant change has been the election of an Islamist government in Cairo that is allied with Hamas, which may narrow Israel's maneuvering room in confronting the Palestinian group. Israel and Egypt made peace in 1979.

In attacks on Saturday, Israel destroyed the house of a Hamas commander near the Egyptian border.

Casualties there were averted however, because Israel had fired non-exploding missiles at the building beforehand from a drone, which the militant's family understood as a warning to flee, witnesses said.

Israeli aircraft also bombed Hamas government buildings in Gaza on Saturday, including the offices of Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh and a police headquarters.

Israel's "Iron Dome" missile interceptor system has destroyed more than 200 incoming rockets from Gaza in mid-air since Wednesday, saving Israeli towns and cities from potentially significant damage.

However, one rocket salvo unleashed on Sunday evaded Iron Dome and wounded two people when it hit a house in the coastal city of Ashkelon, police said.

(Writing by Allyn Fisher-Ilan and Jeffrey Heller; Editing by Crispian Balmer and Mark Heinrich)

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Obama lands in Bangkok to launch Asia tour

BANGKOK: US President Barack Obama landed in Thailand on Sunday, intensifying his diplomatic "pivot" to Asia, on a tour which will see him make history by visiting Myanmar in a bid to encourage political reform.

He will be the first sitting US president to set foot in the nation, reflecting a dramatic thaw in relations brought about by sweeping political changes under a new reformist government.

Obama, who has dubbed himself America's first "Pacific president", landed in Bangkok and was due to have an audience with Thailand's revered but ailing King Bhumibol Adulyadej, as well as talks with Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra.

The highlight of his tour will come on Monday when he flies into Yangon and meets President Thein Sein, followed by democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi, and makes a major speech at Yangon University, a symbolic cockpit of student unrest.

He will then journey to Cambodia for the East Asia Summit, taking place amid renewed disquiet in the region over the geopolitical consequences of China's rise amid a flurry of territorial disputes.

Obama is making his fifth visit to Asia since taking office in 2009 and his second this year, a period otherwise consumed by heavy-duty campaigning ahead of his poll triumph on November 6.

Obama's first stop in Thailand is meant to signal that Washington is committed to a strong set of alliances in a region preoccupied by the geopolitical implications of a rising China.

"Allies are the cornerstone of our rebalancing effort in Asia," said Ben Rhodes, a US deputy national security advisor, as Obama flew to Bangkok aboard Air Force One.

"Thailand is actually the oldest treaty ally of the United States, an ally since 1954 and a key partner in Southeast Asia."

With Yingluck, with whom he will also have a press conference, Obama plans to discuss US cooperation with Thailand, counter-narcotics issues, terrorism and trade. He will also inaugurate a programme to connect US and Thai universities.

The White House hopes Obama's visit to Myanmar will give a fresh boost to Thein Sein's reform drive, which saw Suu Kyi enter parliament after her rivals in the junta made way for a nominally civilian government -- albeit in a system still stacked heavily in favour of the military.

Some human rights groups said Obama should have waited longer to visit, arguing that he could have dangled the prospect of a trip as leverage to seek more progress such as the release of scores of remaining political prisoners.

But officials say that Obama will encourage the regime to double down on more reform, and that his influence could be important at a crucial moment in Myanmar's emergence from decades of isolation and repression.

The United States on Friday scrapped a nearly decade-old ban on most imports from the country, after earlier lifting other sanctions.

Myanmar last week pardoned hundreds more prisoners but they were apparently mostly common criminals and not dissidents. Activists slammed the move as a ploy to curry favour before Obama's visit.

Ahead of the visit, Rhodes said Myanmar had made "positive" steps towards weaning itself off a military relationship with North Korea, and dangled the carrot of future military exercises with US and Thai forces if the reform effort is sustained.

Thein Sein has said Myanmar will refrain from military cooperation with North Korea, but sectors of the country's powerful military are believed to be resistant to cutting all ties with the state.

The trip will be somewhat overshadowed by a wave of violence in Myanmar's western Rakhine state between ethnic Rakhines and minority Rohingyas, which the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation Saturday branded as "genocide".

Obama will also be the first sitting US president to visit Cambodia late on Monday for talks with Prime Minister Hun Sen, ahead of the East Asia summit.

But Rhodes said the White House had "grave concerns" over Cambodia's record on human rights, and Obama would not be visiting were it not for the fact that the East Asia Summit is being held there.

Cambodia has been a staunch supporter of China. It was seen as scuttling an initiative on resolving Asian maritime disputes when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited for regional talks in July.

On the summit's sidelines, Obama will meet China's outgoing premier Wen Jiabao and Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda of Japan, whose relations with Beijing have frayed because of rival territorial claims.

- AFP/xq

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Bal Thackerey's funeral procession gets massive live TV coverage

NEW DELHI: At best, Shiv Sena supremo Bal Thackeray, who died in Mumbai Saturday, was a regional leader. But his charisma and the controversies he was involved in for nearly six decades brought his funeral procession the kind of massive live TV news coverage not witnessed for any other regional leader.

All the big guns of TV journalism were there to anchor the coverage of a funeral, which was nothing but a vicarious treat of a public spectacle for a Sunday audience.

All television channels competed with each other to give the best shot of the funeral procession of the leader who was the militant flag-bearer of Hindu nationalism and who did not hesitate to resort to mob tactics to have his will enforced. Thackeray was 86.

Since early morning, TV channels zoomed live footage of the procession that brought Mumbai to a standstill into the drawing rooms and bedrooms of tens and millions of TV viewers.

Interestingly, Times Now had seven camera crew covering the funeral process, while NDTV had at least three crew out in the field.

But his death deserved such a frenzy, said media watcher and Centre for Media Studies chairman N. Bhaskara Rao.

First and foremost, according to Rao, was the "emotional connect" that many in Mumbai have with the senior Thackeray, whose political journey began and ended with the megalopolis and for the Maharashtrian population of the country's financial capital.

"Thackeray had a distinct personality. He did not fall into the usual categories of politicians that we see in Delhi. He was far apart from all of them and was unambiguous in his political views. He had been in politics for long and has got entangled in many controversies. All these are a good story to tell at a time when he is no more," Rao told IANS.

For this reason alone, he "deserves" the kind of coverage he got, Rao said, noting that television channels have a lot of footage from all these years of his political life that they would like to flaunt at this hour.

"It is quite tempting for any TV channel to bring out those footage and show it to their viewers. This is one compulsion that the new media has," he noted.

Another reason Rao could cite was the day of the funeral being Sunday and not much pan-India news breaks happening on account of the weekly holiday.

"Mumbai is a big market for all the television channels. Anything big in such a market is big for the channels too," he added.

And last, but not the least, the political story that the demise of Thackeray has kicked up -- the future of his Shiv Sena itself under son Uddhav and if there is a possibility of merger with the breakaway Maharashtra Navnirman Sena of cousin Raj.

"All these factors and elements add up to a good, massive coverage. The funeral procession and the political message suits the television medium," Rao added.

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EU drug regulator OKs Novartis' meningitis B shot

LONDON (AP) — Europe's top drug regulator has recommended approval for the first vaccine against meningitis B, made by Novartis AG.

There are five types of bacterial meningitis. While vaccines exist to protect against the other four, none has previously been licensed for type B meningitis. In Europe, type B is the most common, causing 3,000 to 5,000 cases every year.

Meningitis mainly affects infants and children. It kills about 8 percent of patients and leaves others with lifelong consequences such as brain damage.

In a statement on Friday, Andrin Oswald of Novartis said he is "proud of the major advance" the company has made in developing its vaccine Bexsero. It is aimed at children over two months of age, and Novartis is hoping countries will include the shot among the routine ones for childhood diseases such as measles.

Novartis said the immunization has had side effects such as fever and redness at the injection site.

Recommendations from the European Medicines Agency are usually adopted by the European Commission. Novartis also is seeking to test the vaccine in the U.S.

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Israel's Iron Dome Proves Effective Defense

Israel said that it will install a fifth "Iron Dome" battery before the end of the year, adding another installation to the country's missile defense system, which has proven itself this week, intercepting more than 150 rockets fired from the Gaza Strip.

The missile defense system, which can identify enemy rockets, determine if they pose a threat to populated areas, and destroy them within a matter of seconds, has been praised by Israel's leaders for saving hundreds of lives.

The system, however, comes with a steep price. Each interceptor missile, which includes a radar guidance system, costs $40,000. Israel has not disclosed how many missiles are required to take down an enemy rocket or how many interceptors it has fired, but experts estimate the country has fired $8 million worth of missiles in the past three days.

The Israelis are only trying to shoot down about a third of the rockets fired by militants, those on a trajectory towards populated areas, said Ben Goodlad, a senior aerospace and defense analyst at IHS Jane's. But of the rockets Iron Dome has targeted, the system is between 87 and 90 percent successful in destroying.

"That is an incredibly high success rate for the system," he said. "What isn't clear is how many interceptor missiles are fired. There may be two, three, or four fired at a one time to take down a rocket."

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Palestinian militants working out of the Gaza Strip, a ribbon of coastline controlled by Hamas, have for years been stockpiling short- and medium-range rockets, built at a fraction of the cost of the Iron Dome missiles and then stored in highly populated areas near hospitals and schools.

Hamas is considered by the U.S. and Europe Union as a terrorist organization.

Militants this week fired rockets further into Israel than ever before, targeting the country's two largest cities, Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, but there were no casualties in those cities. Three Israelis were killed by rockets elsewhere in Israel.

"We are very pleased with the interception rates," aerial defense commander Brig. Gen. Shachar Shochet told reporters on Thursday. "We have intercepted dozens of Grad and Qassam rockets fired by Hamas and other groups, and prevented serious harm to our civilians."

Defense Minister Ehud Barak said the country the system had saved lives.

"No other country in the world has technology like the Iron Dome," Barak said. "Had the system not existed, many civilians would be in harm's way. However, the system is not a 100 percent foolproof defense, and does not absolve citizens of their duty to closely follow instructions given by Homefront Command."

The system is not perfect, and can be breeched by a large volley of rockets fired at once, a problem of "saturation," said former White House counterterrorism adviser and ABC News consultant Dick Clark.

Israel, therefore, plans to target the rocket stockpiles rather than continue to shoot down individual missiles. Israel has called up more than 60,000 reserve soldiers and appears to be planning a ground strike in Gaza soon.

Currently four mobile batteries equipped with sophisticated radar technology and missiles and on-board radar, are combined to create a shield over the country.

In 2006, 4,000 rockets were fired at Israel during a war with Lebanon that left 44 civilians dead. In response, the Israeli Defense Forces and Israeli defense manufacturer Rafael Advanced Defense Systems began developing Iron Dome.

In 2010, after tests proved effective, the United States began funding the program in part. Earlier this year, Congress authorized $600 million for the program, with instructions that the U.S. would eventually begin co-production of the system.

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